Feathers in the Wind
by Kitten Kisses
Summary: FE7. The lives of Fiora, Farina, and Florina told in 365 individually-posted drabbles. 005: For the first time in many years, she cried.
1. Cold Snap

**Feathers in the Wind  
By: Manna

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**001: Cold Snap**

Wind had the _potential_ to be beautiful, she supposed. Maybe there was someone, somewhere, who felt it caress their face, and drew the conclusion that there was something beautiful about it.

All she knew of wind was that it stung, it burned, it chapped, and it killed. Not her, no, _never_ her. Farina felt invincible. She refused to lose to something she couldn't see.

A million spirits died when the wind kicked up in Ilia. She saw it in the gaunt cheekbones and the thin frames of her neighbors. Even her sisters could not escape it.

The heavy pine door took a lot of effort to close, but she managed it alone. She really was tired of it all—the arguing, mostly, but there were other things she was tired of, too. She decided that being hungry was at the top of her list. _Nothing_ was worse than that.

Before she turned away, she spared one last, long look at their ramshackle house, at its sloped roof, the crooked porch rails, and the small, dirty windows. A long time ago, it had been home, but what had it become? She wasn't sure.

Sunlight streamed down from above, but it did nothing to warm her. She pulled her hood over her head and started to walk, ignoring the sting of the air as it went through her. Hours would pass before anyone noticed her absence, and by then, she and Murphy would be long gone.

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**Author Notes:**

Fiora, Farina, and Florina in 365 drabbles. Notes can be found for all chapters (as they are posted) at Swayingtheflame on Livejournal.


	2. Sister Circle

**Feathers in the Wind  
By: Manna

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**002: Sister Circle**

Most children enter adulthood remembering very little of their early childhood. Fiora was no exception, though she was the oldest and remembered more than her two younger sisters. Long, silky hair that reminded her of the sky behind the Aurora Borealis, and a straight nose were things that she linked with the term _mother_, though the angle of her jaw and the color of her eyes had been forgotten.

She had always been jealous that Farina had their mother's hair, and she herself had only gotten the nose, one that never felt like it fit her face.

"_You're the oldest, Fiora,"_ her mother always said, and no matter how old she got, she still remembered those words, though the sound of the woman's voice faded, only to be replaced by her own. _"You're the oldest."_

She had said it before any siblings arrived, and she had said it only moments before her death. _"You're the oldest, Fiora. The oldest. That means…"_

"_What, Mother? What does it mean?"_

"_It means you're the only one who can keep this family together."_

And then she'd left. Left her, left Farina, left Florina. Left all of them. After the funeral, she had turned to her sisters with an expression that no child should be forced to wear. _"I'm the oldest," _she'd said in a perfect impression of her dead mother.

She'd been nine years old, then. Farina had been six, and Florina, only four.

"_So, what?"_

Fiora had been taken aback by the expression on her younger sisters' faces, and so she took their hands in her own and held them tight. Florina completed the circle by clutching Farina's finger.

"_It means I have to keep this family together,"_ she said.

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	3. Fairytales

**Feathers in the Wind **  
**By: Manna

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**003: Fairytales**

Butterflies were things that did not exist in Ilia. She'd read about them in books, though, and when she saw a pegasus for the first time, she stared at it with wide eyes. _"Butterfly?"_ she asked, her blankie clutched in her small fist.

Farina told that story to anyone who listened, and Florina hated it. _"It had wings,"_ she'd argued. _"And the book talked about a creature with wings!"_

"_They're very different, you know. They're nothing alike!" _Farina had bragged, but Fiora told her, years later, that Farina had never seen a real butterfly before, either.

Ilia was not blessed with many books. Most people didn't know how to read, and those that did oftentimes took the secret of it to the grave with them. Florina felt very fortunate to have been able to learn. _"Mother taught me to read before she…passed, and now I am teaching you."_

Farina never read at all, and Fiora hadn't the time. So Florina curled up in her bed and read the same few worn, leather-bound books that were in the house. She read them over and over again, until the ink had smeared the yellowing pages. She didn't need to read the words to know the stories, anyway; she had memorized them long ago.

The fairy tales were her favorites. Sometimes they were tragic, sometimes they were happy, but they were always, _always_ beautiful.

"Do you think true love exists?" she asked her eldest sister, once.

Fiora had been preparing to leave the house on a mission, but she stopped in her tracks to think, pressing a forefinger gently against her lower lip as she thought. She sighed, and answered after a long moment, "I don't know."

"I know fairytales aren't real," she said, and hugged her sister as tightly as she could before she finished her thought with, "but it would be nice to find something like true love."

Fiora only smiled.

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	4. From Bad to Worse

**Feathers in the Wind **  
**By: Manna

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**004: From Bad to Worse**

She left to escape. The cold, the fear, she wanted to leave it behind her in that little shack she'd always called a house. She remembered nothing but hard times and harder times. Food? She worried that they wouldn't have enough. She worried…that they wouldn't have any at all.

Freedom was something she hadn't tasted. The wind of Ilia came from somewhere else, somewhere different. Farina wondered if it came from a better place. Maybe in other places, people had food on their table every night. Maybe, in other places, people didn't huddle under the blankets with their entire family just to stay warm. _Maybe, in other places…_food could be bought with _money_.

_Money_, not a touch, not a long, lusty stare.

Money, something nearly impossible to come by in the snow-covered fields of Ilia.

Murphy's thick fur blocked some of the wind that rushed into the small cave, and Farina tugged helplessly on the corners of the wool blanket that was wrapped around her shoulders to try and keep herself warm.

Nothing had changed, she realized. She still felt the fear deep in her bones. Where would her next meal come from? Where would she sleep at night? And oh, _how ironic_! She was surrounded by snow, but she was so, so thirsty.

For the first time in her life, she missed the sound of Fiora talking in her sleep. She missed the way Florina would cry and cry for no real reason at all.

She chuckled dryly as her pegasus draped his head over her shoulder. "We'll be okay," she said, touching his cold muzzle with her numb fingertips. "We'll make it."

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**Author Notes:**

I only want to make one thing perfectly clear: the lives of the pegasus sisters as portrayed in this piece of fiction are my personal head-canon, not canon in-game.


	5. Despair

**Feathers in the Wind  
By: Manna

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**005: Despair**

She hated to argue, hated it more than anything. Whenever one started, Farina would scream and Florina would cry, and Fiora's nerves would fray and fray until finally they snapped and she said things she regretted saying.

She remembered only snatches of the final one.

_("…tired of this shitty house!")("Sharing every last crumb of bread!")("Nothing ever gets done!")("You don't even try!")("It's like you don't care!")("You're not my mother!")("Shut up and do something if bothers you so much!")("Do something with what? We don't have anything!")_

A smattering of thoughts and words and tears as Farina had screamed and Florina had cried and Fiora simply gave up.

In the end her sister had wanted something Fiora could never give her: stability.

_("If you don't like it, then just leave!")_

So Fiora had come home one evening to find Florina unattended, and Farina's things gone. For the first time in many years, she had cried.

Never in her life had she felt such despair as she had then; even when they'd had nothing to eat, even when they'd had to bring snow inside to let it melt for water…at least they had been together, a family.

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End file.
